


the purple hyacinth crown

by embersdevine



Category: Supernatural
Genre: M/M, Pining Sam Winchester, Stanford Era (Supernatural), Witch Sam Winchester
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-24
Updated: 2019-12-24
Packaged: 2021-02-18 16:10:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,544
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21930193
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/embersdevine/pseuds/embersdevine
Summary: Dean always hated witches.
Relationships: Dean Winchester/Sam Winchester
Comments: 14
Kudos: 116





	the purple hyacinth crown

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ashtraythief](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ashtraythief/gifts).



> For the spn_j2_xmas gift exchange! This is for ashtraythief, who mentioned wanting witch!Sam and my mind narrowly focused on that. Hope this is enjoyable for you!

Dean always hated witches. 

  
  


Witches had been reserved for the big hunts; the ones John planned to make a lesson. The hard kind that stuck with Sam. Sometimes, he wonders, if their father meant to make those hunts into something only Sam would learn. Dean hated witches. Hated the smell of their dens, hated the vials of various liquids atop tables, hated the dead animal organs in boxes or the fridge, hated magic being an option in a fight. 

  
  


Sam couldn’t stand witch hunts. Not for the reasons Dean despised them. He couldn’t fathom killing another human being. Hadn’t they set out to kill monsters? Not wayward humans. Walking away from those hunts as Dean muttered endlessly about the witch gunk that got on his band shirt and his father grunting in acknowledgement, Sam felt sour inside. As if something was growing inside him; vines creeping between his ribcage. 

  
  


Sam now understands why. 

  
  


\---

  
  


Sixteen years old meant barely contained outrage and stored bitterness. Sam remembers every little thing had his fists balled, stuffed into his jacket pockets and gritting his teeth. And then he remembers his brother’s hands. A simple touch would do. A brush against his shoulder, a hair ruffle, a playful hit to his arm. And that would unravel any anger that had nearly overtaken him. 

  
  


Eighteen did him no favors, however. Not even the longing for his brother’s touch would cure him of this fury. It hurt that it didn’t. 

  
  


Because when Dean found him at that bus stop, the heartbreak showed through the cracks. The tiny green soldier had finally broken and it had been Sam to do it. He remembers Dean had reached out, took him by the arm. 

  
  


“You want this?”

  
  


_This_. 

  
  


Sam had thought he wanted a lot of things in his short lifetime thus far. Christmas with a big family, bonfires with only firewood to fuel them, a house and his own bedroom, to tell a crush he lives a pretty normal life and it’d be the truth. 

  
  


But Dean had asked if he wanted to leave. To get away from this life. Dean wouldn’t understand and, honestly, Sam wasn’t sure if he ever would. Dean couldn’t separate family and hunting. They were the same to him, as it was the same to their father. But Sam knew better. 

  
  


He stepped closer, gave a small smile that slipped from his face as he ducked his head. “Dean---”

  
  


“Forget about college,” his brother murmurs, “It’ll be different.”

  
  


It’s the closest he’s ever heard Dean beg. It terrified him on some level. The soldier, the oldest, the stronger one. 

  
  


Sam shut his eyes tight, shook his head. “I can’t do this anymore.”

  
  


“Sammy…”

  
  


“Let me do this,” he said. Looked him in the eyes and he knew he must have looked younger to Dean then because his brother seemed to consider it. He opened his mouth to say something else. _Come with me. You can do whatever---just come to California and---_

  
  


He stopped himself. 

  
  


He couldn’t do that to Dean. He didn’t want to know the answer. If it came between Sam and their father, he was afraid of what Dean would choose. 

  
  


The bus arrived shortly after. And Sam would go. 

  
  


\---

  
  


He finds a book in the Stanford library. The kind he remembers seeking out as a kid to do research for hunts. It’s old and looks lonely, placed against the other books decades younger. Nostalgia grips him. So he takes it to one of the tables in the back. 

  
  


It’s a book on witchcraft. Of course it is. 

  
  


_Dean always hated witches_ , he thinks. 

  
  


In a strange sense, he feels as if Dean’s not too far away as he flips through the text. The words seem familiar, as if he’d read them several times before. He continues, forgetting his original task of finding books for a research paper. Instead, he’s engrossed in this book without a real home for itself. 

  
  


It explains spells and the history of different witches over the centuries. He wishes he could have found this when he had been a teenager. He would have appreciated it more then. Not now, a freshman in college and way in over his head. 

  
  


He shuts it then. Normal. That’s what he wished for. He puts the book back where he found it. 

  
  


\---

  
  


Brady rambles on about classes and girls, which Sam supposes is par for the course in this world. It’s been an unnatural culture shock of sorts. Being by himself never felt so odd. Brady fills in the gaps Sam leaves with his quietness solace. A friend, among a sea of faceless people, he supposes. 

  
  


They share stories of their childhood. Sam accidentally mentions that he's got a brother and that opens up an avenue of questions that go left unanswered. After awhile, Brady gives up and moves on to getting him out to the parties, which is more successful. 

  
  


\---

  
  


He’s curious. 

  
  


The book is where he’d left it last time. It sits there high on the shelf, simply waiting. So he sits at the same table, in the same chair and picks up where he left off. 

  
  


He imagines the witches the book explains. Witches who don’t always derive their power from demonic means. Witches who dwell in the woods, surround themselves in the land and borrow power from nature. Witches who lived among citizens, considered the local healers and were generally accepted. Witches who were revered and respected, called upon the stars for magic. 

  
  


Sam thinks about the lives they must have led. Before hunters marked them as too unnatural, before demons claimed souls and offered a few years of unbridled power. He wonders what it must be like to simply be a witch nowadays, untouched by the dark and living within the natural world. 

  
  


What a life that must be. 

  
  


\---

  
  


His PO box has a yellow envelope in the mail. It’s mostly wrinkled by the time he gets it back to his dorm room, dirtied by the transit and no return address. But he knows who it’s from before he opens it. 

  
  


Out falls a bulky cell phone. Nokia something, he doesn’t know. And then there’s a note folded up, stuffed within the envelope. In all capital letters, his name is scribbled on it. 

  
  


Sam throws both the note and phone on the desk and begins his homework. 

  
  


\---

  
  


There’s not much wild vegetation around Stanford. On campus, everything has been planted throughout the years. But just a little beyond it, Palo Alto offers the Ravenswood Preserve. A marshland that sits south of the San Francisco Bay. It’ll do. 

  
  


He travels by bike, something he managed to buy off a senior who was graduating. It’s closed at night but that doesn’t stop him. His childhood consisted of breaking and entering. Besides, he’d rather try this under the cover of night. 

  
  


He finds a spot by the water. A dock that’s decades old. The water is still and black below, the reflection of a half moon scattered atop its surface. There’s the typical smell of water and plant life all around, somewhat muted by the California winter of forty-something degrees. 

  
  


Opening the book, he turns to the page he had folded the corner of, finding the words quite easily. It’s a simple spell. A party trick, if anything. But he wants to find out. He says the words. 

  
  


Something twists inside him and it doesn’t feel terrible. It’s new but neutral, perhaps it’s churning what’s already been there. He glances down as he repeats the incantation, watches as the water ripples. 

  
  


At first, it looks like a scene from a cheap horror film. Dark vines snake up the dock’s posts, like veins beneath the skin. He beckons them closer. Seaweed, overgrowing at his call. He allows them to stop as they finally reach him, stilled. 

  
  


He breathes out a laugh, reaches for one of the vines and it raises to meet his grasp. It wraps itself around his thumb and over the top of his hand, as if greeting him. 

  
  


Sam chuckles to himself, glancing up to the half moon that witnesses the display. 

  
  


\---

  
  


There’s a missed call from an unknown number on the cellphone he never wanted. 

  
  


He knows who it’s from. There’s no one else in his former life who would come looking for him. Only Dean. Always Dean. 

  
  


He tosses the book on the bed, sits down at his desk and stares at the note with his name on it. It’s his brother trying to reestablish a bond, he knows. It’s Dean trying to be a big brother, trying to _accept_. But Sam---

  
  


\---Sam has issues. 

  
  


(That _something_ that grew in between his ribs? He didn’t just feel it when they killed witches or any other ambiguous human that happened to turn to the dark side. 

  
  


He felt it every time his brother smiled fondly at him. Felt it suffocating him when their bodies were too close, wrapped up together in a Minnesota snow storm. Felt it when he’d jerk Sam to him when a monster got too close and his reflexes weren’t fast enough. Felt it when he’d say _Sammy_ in that strange and gentle way; a tone reserved only for him. 

  
  


It’s always been there, just like Dean has. And maybe that’s another reason he didn’t ask Dean to come with him. He needed to purge it from his system. There’s something inside him that isn’t right. Leaving Dean meant having to tear pieces of himself away, scattered on a road to Palo Alto.)

  
  


He sighs, rubs a hand over his face and pushes the note to the back of the desk. 

  
  


\---

  
  


Brady makes fun of his hairstyle, says it’s not the 80’s. “We’re in the new century, man! Get a new haircut.”

  
  


But he won’t. Because maybe it’s last piece of himself he’ll keep. The reminder of his outright rebellion towards his father and the playful insults from his brother. Strangely, he doesn’t mind having those memories. Perhaps they seem the most normal. 

  
  


\---

  
  


Often now, when he’s through with homework, he takes the book back to Ravenswood. 

  
  


The seaweed vines greet him without his beckoning now, which would probably alarm him if he was anyone else. He always did want a pet. Slightly animated vegetation is good enough, right? 

  
  


He sits on the dock, allowing the seaweed snake around him. Sometimes, he attempts to form them into various shapes, tests this newfound ability. It’s not much, honestly. But he’s satisfied with it. 

  
  


It doesn’t feel like he’s changing. It’s as if it’s always been a part of him; this twisted type of connection to the earth. Requesting it to bend to his will for just a bit of time. Borrowing its life so that he could entertain himself. 

  
  


There’s a witch the book speaks of; a witch who stressed the importance of _asking_ the earth for its power. He likes that. In the end, it’s not his. He’s fine with that. 

  
  


\---

  
  


The phone rings when he’s nearly finished with an analysis on a case study. It buzzes and moves across the surface of his desk, leashed by the charger. That’s a problem in itself because if he didn’t want to talk to his brother, why does he keep the phone alive?

  
  


Like some lovesick fool, he answers it. Doesn’t say a word. 

  
  


_“Sammy?”_

  
  


His chest tightens and he’s sure his pulse paused. 

  
  


_“Sammy, that you?”_

  
  


“Yeah,” he clears his throat, “It’s me.”

  
  


There’s some silence on the other end and Sam thinks that maybe his impulsiveness put him in a precarious situation. He accepted the call, which means he’s allowed this--- _thing_ back in his life. That twisted, terrible thing that has him delighted to just hear his brother’s voice. 

  
  


_“Thought maybe I got the wrong address.”_

  
  


“No...I got it a few weeks ago.”

  
  


The admission means more than willful ignorance. It probably stings Dean, knowing that. An unspoken message. _I don’t want to talk to you anymore_. Even if that kills him too. 

  
  


_“Oh. Yeah, I just---I don’t know if you read the letter. I bought minutes for your phone and all. Just---just in case you wanna…”_

  
  


Dean Winchester is built on nonverbal communication and social ques. He’s street smart, well versed in all the horror films and knows how to sweet talk any straight girl. But over the phone, Dean is used to reporting or faking a persona for a case. Talking like this? 

  
  


Well, it’s not his thing. And right now, Sam thinks it’s not his thing either. 

  
  


“Where you guys at now?”

  
  


An olive branch of sorts. Dean is trying, he might as well do the same. 

  
  


There’s some shuffling in the background and then the distinct sound of glass lightly hitting wood. A beer bottle. It occurs to Sam that he’s called him while drinking. He wonders if alcohol is the only reason Dean’s calling now. Just enough confidence. 

  
  


_“East coast. Poltergeist in Rhode Island. Remember when we came here for a haunting?”_

  
  


“Yeah, we were stuck digging two graves.”

  
  


_“It was about Thanksgiving then too.”_

  
  


Oh. That’s right. It’s nearly Thanksgiving. Dean had never been sentimental about the holidays. What he couldn't wait for was New Year’s Eve because that’s when he could get a free kiss at the countdown in whatever hole-in-the-wall bar. 

  
  


Sam hums, sits back in his chair as he flips the pen between his fingers. “Did you call me to go down memory lane, Dean?”

  
  


There’s a pause and he knows it had been a slightly cruel line but his brother knows better than to bring these things up. Instead, Dean answers with, _“Just wanted to hear you.”_

  
  


And perhaps that has that _something_ twisting inside him more than anything before. He holds his breath, closes his eyes. That’s not fair. 

  
  


_“Talk to me, Sammy.”_

  
  


He runs a hand through his hair, lets out an exhale. His eyes catch sight of the book that lays on his bed and it feels like an awful secret in the open. Just like that _something_ he thought he could weed out when he stepped on that bus. A vain hope to rid himself of a feeling that felt a whole lot like infatuation. Or obsession. Either one would not end up well for him anyway. 

  
  


And now it’s back. Just by hearing Dean, it comes to him in waves. Fuck, he’s sick with something. 

  
  


“What do you want me to say, Dean?” 

  
  


It comes out with a tad of frustration but it’s not aimed at his brother. It’s projection. Dean’s trying to reconnect after six months of silence. It’s still all too fresh. 

  
  


_“Just say anythin’, man,”_ comes the murmur, _“What’s college life like? You got a girlfriend? Or boyfriend, y’know, I won’t judge you.”_

  
  


It’s meant to be a joke but Sam can’t help but feel slightly exposed by it. “Dean…”

  
  


_“Sorry, just wanna… I don’t fuckin’ know.”_

  
  


Sam closes his eyes once more, pretends the baggage between them isn’t as heavy as it truly is. Pretends those awful feelings he has don’t exist. Just---he pretends. 

  
  


“Okay,” he whispers into the phone. “I’m studying law.”

  
  
  


\---

  
  


It goes on like that for awhile. And, for a time, he can set aside everything for the little talks over the phone. Late at night, when Brady is out doing God knows what and he’s by himself. 

  
  


It’s always Dean who calls. And he’s usually drunk or high or both. He knows Dad isn’t around because there’s no other way Dean would dial his number. His brother buys minutes for his phone and they simply continue talking. 

  
  


He shares his college life, what classes he’s taking, what papers he’s writing, the parties he seldom attends. Dean talks about cases, what beef a ghost had, a possible black dog sighting, the girls he caught up with after the hunts. Dean never brings up their father. And Sam doesn’t mention the magic. 

  
  


It’s simple enough. 

  
  


\---

  
  


After a year, Sam decides to extend his newfound ability. 

  
  


The Redwood National Park is a drive but during winter break, he’s got enough time. After reserving a camping spot, he waits until nightfall. He shivers at the bitter cold. It’s unlike the ones in the midwest, he’s noticed. Here, it’s dry and chills the bones. But bearable. 

  
  


He walks a path, weaving between the sequoia trees. Grazes his fingertips against a few, seeking the life it may bring. They sing, quietly and low. It’s different than the seaweed; sea-life is more playful, joyous. Here, in the woods, it feels as if the trees have a thousand stories to share and they can only manage one song. It’s peaceful, he thinks. 

  
  


The sequoias take notice of his presence as he walks. He reaches out, mentally calling on them and they answer. Roots slither beside his feet, as if joining him on his stroll on the trail. They accompany him until he gets back to his tent. And even then, he can still hear their song. 

  
  


\---

  
  


After awhile, Dean stops calling and Sam stops waiting. The phone sits in a duffle bag, stuffed under the bed. 

  
  


He pretends that doesn’t bother him either. 

  
  


\---

  
  


Brady changes for the worse. Drugs and alcohol and then it just...kinda stops. He seems to get back to some semblance of who he had been but it seems off. He insists Sam go with him out to parties more often, makes jokes about the succulent on his desk or the late hours Sam puts in for his papers. 

  
  


It’s exhausting after awhile and finally Sam agrees to go out more often. 

  
  


He meets Jessica Moore at a party. Brady introduces him, says Sam will love her. And, eventually, Sam does. Freckles and blonde hair, striking eyes and a smooth voice. She smiles and it’s just amazing. 

  
  


That dark thing that grows within his ribcage doesn’t seem bothered by it, yet he feels like it should. Because it feels like he’s simply trading an adoration for another. Perhaps this is simply a healthier alternative than what he had before. 

  
  


\---

  
  


“It’s funny,” Jess says to him one day, as they move the couch together. “There’s vines here too.”

  
  


“What do you mean?” Sam grunts out, taking over to push the couch to the desired spot. “What vines?”

  
  


“Outside, on the wall.”

  
  


A week after getting an apartment together and both of them late into their junior year, Sam has felt rather comfortable. A nice one bedroom apartment and new furniture. It’ll do for now, he thinks, because Jess is talking about getting a house one day and he thinks, yeah, he’d like that too. 

  
  


“What?”

  
  


“Vines with those purple flowers were outside your dorm room too,” she says with a light smile, peering outside the window, “I don’t know if they’re the same ones but they’re on the side of this building too.”

  
  


“Huh,” he responds, shrugging.

  
  


“Maybe they just follow you,” she grins then, her nose scrunching up in that cute way and he has to smile back. 

  
  


“Maybe.”

  
  


\---

  
  


At twenty-two, Sam loses everything for a second time. 

  
  


The life he thought he could build himself is burned away and engulfed in smoke. He’s dragged away from it by a brother who cared too much to leave right away. 

  
  


It’s like someone had jammed the reset button. Suddenly, he’s back in the Impala, sitting outside an obscure, rundown motel and waiting for his brother to come back with the key for their room. 

  
  


Everything’s out of focus and he closes his eyes. Off in the distance, he can hear a song drift through the night. The melody is muffled but he can still make it out. It’s the woods, in the distance and they feel his sorrow. Cry for him when he cannot. 

  
  


That makes it all the more depressing. 

  
  


\---

  
  


“Come here,” Dean says to him that night, as the old TV plays a football game. 

  
  


Sam merely stares at him, frowns, as if he doesn’t understand the light command. Dean sighs and scooches over on his bed. 

  
  


“Just sit with me.”

  
  


Mutely, Sam doesn’t bother to argue and now two grown men share a twin bed. Memories of his childhood flash through his mind and it’s easier to settle on that than memories of Jess. He settles himself next to his brother, too tired and drained to worry about their proximity. 

  
  


They used to do this a lot. Sit together, not saying a word. Too close but not close enough for Sam. He’d wake up in his brother’s arms, face buried into a band shirt and hearing soft snoring. It had been one of the most familiar places Sam had ever known. 

  
  


Part of him feels some shame for the sneaking feeling coming back. That childhood warmth he remembers so clearly. He wants to cry for Jess, wants to cry for a life he will never have, cry for this despicable, dark thing inside him. 

  
  


But he begins drifting off, back to an abyss and there’s a callused hand running gently through his hair. It’s soothing and heartbreaking all at once. 

  
  


\---

  
  


Sam thinks if he ever were to write a novel, it wouldn’t have a good ending. He projects himself into a narrative that twists back to his story. He realizes this when they come across a certain hunt. 

  
  


They’re still waiting on one of Dad’s cryptic texts and he finds a weird hunt involving missing animal hearts. And of course it turns out to be a witch. 

  
  


A middle aged woman, neat hair, jeans and a nice cardigan. She’s a modern woman. Pretty and warm brown eyes. But she never smiled and he wonders if has anything to do with her magic. 

  
  


He feels it as soon as she opens the door. Like tar, sticking to his skin. As if she’s morphed her magic into the flesh eating monsters they hunt. 

  
  


She barely glances at Dean before her gaze snags on Sam, with a curious look upon her features. “Oh. I remember what it was like.”

  
  


_Dean always hated witches._

  
  


Eventually, they have to stop her. After killing animals, she was planning to harvest human hearts and, well, yeah. They had to stop it. 

  
  


When she’s bleeding out, barely able to move with Dean’s machete pinning her to the wood floor, she reaches for Sam. He draws closer, tentatively and Dean says his name with warning. 

  
  


“It wasn’t always like this,” she whispers, “I used to have light like that.”

  
  


Julie was her name and part of him thinks it could be him on the floor with Dean’s machete through his chest. Perhaps it’s like losing a kin but Sam doesn’t have time to weigh the brief loss. She dies in her home and is burned in the backyard under a waning moon. 

  
  


\---

  
  


In the end, it would be a skinwalker to have Sam reveal the secret. 

  
  


They’re running through a thick forest, somewhere in Oregon. They’re hot on its trail and already had tricked Dean once, which bothers him, Sam knows. The darkness gives the skinwalker enough cover, yet Sam feels as if they’re gonna lose it. 

  
  


Dean’s swearing up a storm when they lose the tracks in a clearing. Sam hunches over, takes a moment to catch his breath and rests his hands on his knees. 

  
  


It’s then he hears it. The light call of the wood. The earth whispers to him, barely enough to understand or translate but he gets it just in time. It’s a desperate plead of sorts. 

  
  


Alarmed, Sam looks up as the skinwalker rushes out into the clearing to attack his brother. 

  
  


“Dean!”

  
  


He raises his hands, as if he could pull Dean out of danger’s way but instead a wall of wood and dirt rises from the ground. It shakes the earth they stand upon for a moment and Sam falls back. It knocks the wind out of him and he hardly has time to register what had just occurred. 

  
  


Still aware of the danger, Sam encloses his hands and the roots that had protected his brother now encase the skinwalker until he hears the distinct sound of bone crushing. 

  
  


He lets out a large breath. He’s shaking, still hearing the whispers of the earth, as if attempting to soothe him. But Sam’s adrenaline is pumping at high volume through his veins, intoxicating and terrifying. 

  
  


“Sam…?”

  
  


And then his whole world crashes down once more. He snaps his gaze to his brother, far more petrified now than before. 

  
  


Dean has a matching expression. 

  
  


Sam runs. 

  
  


\---

  
  


_Dean always hated witches._

  
  


\---

  
  


His brother finds him at an abandoned shed in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by sprouting hyacinths. They grow around his body as he buries his head inside his arms, having brought his knees to his chest. A strange sight, for someone so tall, he supposes. 

  
  


But Dean’s found him like that so many times before. Curled up on some dark corner and dragged him out. Dean always finds Sam, no matter what. He should know this by now. 

  
  


(Part of him---well, a _big_ part of him realizes he never wanted Dean to stop chasing him. Chasing that bond that held taunt after four years. Chasing what they had all their young lives. Chasing _Sam_. He could never understand it and yet he’d yearn for it all the same. That sick, twisted thing in his chest feels like it’s blooming into something else and he doesn’t try to stop it anymore.)

  
  


Dean grunts as he sits down next to Sam, sighing out as he rests an elbow on his knee. Sam peers through thick bangs and watches him closely. His brother looks skywards, towards the dotted sky and a full moon. 

  
  


“That night...when you left,” Dean says quietly, “You looked like you wanted to say somethin’.”

  
  


Sam raises his head a bit more. 

  
  


“I used to imagine what that was,” he continues and shakes his head with a rueful smile. “Fantasize you tellin’ me we could just run away. Hunt together or...I don’t know. Do whatever you wanted.”

  
  


There’s a sting in Sam’s eyes and he furiously blinks it away. _Now_ , of all times? 

  
  


“I woulda, y’know,” he looks at Sam then, steadfast and serious. “Just dropped everything to be with ya.”

  
  


Sam swallows, feels the light song of the purple hyacinths, urging him. “I was gonna ask you to come with me.”

  
  


Dean lets out a breathy chuckle, as if he’d been anxious about the response. He looks away. “Of course.”

  
  


“Why doesn’t this bother you?”

  
  


“What?”

  
  


“The...magic.”

  
  


Dean takes longer to answer for that one. He waits for it, fearing it may not be what he wants to hear. But then:

  
  


“Something’s...wrong with me, Sammy,” he says, like it explains everything. And, strangely, for Sam, it does. “I think I would do anythin’ for you. Dad missing and losing you so many times, I don’t---I don’t think there’s anything I wouldn’t do for you.”

  
  


Sam understands, so he says, “There’s something’s wrong with me too.”

  
  


\---

  
  


Dean kisses him under a full moon and among regretful flowers. He runs a hand through his hair and rests his forehead against Sam’s with a bittersweet smile. It’s awful and wonderful all at once and Sam’s okay with that. 


End file.
